Biologist Dr. E.O.Wilson spent many countless childhood hours watching ants. His unremitting interest eventually led to his ground-breaking research into sociobiology and biodiversity, becoming renown as the world's leading expert on myrmecology.

As the months passed, the rhythm that so many had spoken of never came. Our days were a marvelous performance of song and dance, intense tears followed by laughter, hours and hours of books. His quiet could only be had by listening to my voice stumble over Dostoyevsky or Dickens.

Remind your child today what being a kid is all about. Finding joy in the everyday adventures and realizing that there is adventure in the every ordinary, below-average day, because to a child nothing is truly ever ordinary.

Students (young and older) respond to instruction in the way that is expected of them. If taught as if they are slow, students will conform to that perception. Imagine what would happen if we treated all students, from the earliest years through their post-secondary studies, as if there were geniuses inside, simply waiting for recognition.

We also are doing a far better job at staffing our schools with the special education personnel that can oversee the progress of these students and offer appropriate advice and support for teachers and parents.

People who are exceptionally intelligent in one or more areas can be particularly difficult to choose gifts for, either because their interests are so esoteric (e.g., physics) or so focused that you are inclined to expand their horizons (e.g., no more puzzles, no more comics!).

Today I want to talk about 'a good education,' one of the priority areas for the United Nations My World Global Survey. But there is a specific segment of education which I believe is being overlooked to our detriment.

Giftedness is no guarantee for success. In fact, the world is full of gifted failures and yet we, as parents, often hope and pray we have gifted children. This is then a parenting misperception used to validate a parent's sense of worth.

Sure, they are smart, but all children are smart. They are talented, but all children have talents. Nope, my children are not any more special than any other children in the city of Milwaukee. Only difference is my children are privileged and lucky. They have had opportunities that only privilege can buy.

In South Africa, the state set black people up for failure and hamstrung black advancement, while using the under-education of black people as evidence for why they required subjugation and guidance instead of the vote. So how well did it work?

Beginning in early elementary grades, TAG programs separate student peers for the sake of individualized learning initiatives. Though the ideology is sound, the reality is often a monotone, unattractive look at contemporary American public schools.

Derek's abilities are amazing. Where, precisely, do they come from? I am struck by the profound contradiction between the language on the page, which calls Derek's talent "innate," and details of Adam Ockelford's actual presentation.

Gifted children are, by definition, "Children who give evidence of high performance capability in areas such as intellectual, creative, artistic, leadership capacity, or specific academic fields, and who require services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop such capabilities."

Our jobs as homeschoolers is not easy. Oh, how I wish it were. But it's not, and we have to take steps to ensure we have the energy -- mental, physical, and emotional -- to do what we do with the kids we're doing it with.

A good teacher can appear in the most unlikely places. This one surprised me more than any other, the child that love created who was revived by a powerful love of his own. It really can be as simple as that, if only we are smart enough to realize it.